The present invention relates to methods and compositions for treating subterranean formations, and more specifically, to improved methods and compositions for degrading filter cake deposited in a subterranean formation.
Filter cake, the residue deposited on a permeable medium when servicing fluids contact the medium under a pressure, is formed in a variety of subterranean operations such as drilling, fracturing, and gravel packing. A filter cake is often desirable, at least temporarily, in subterranean operations as it may act to stem the flow of a servicing fluid from its desired location, to the surrounding subterranean formation. For instance, where the servicing fluid is a drilling fluid, a filter cake formed on the wall of the well bore may act to keep the drilling fluid in its desired location, in the annulus between the well bore and the drill pipe, rather than allowing the drilling fluid to leach off into the surrounding formation. Loss of drilling, fracturing, gravel transport and other servicing fluids into the formation represents an increased expense and, if too much fluid is lost, the attendant increase in damage to the producing zones in the formation. Moreover, the presence of a filter cake may add strength and stability to the formation surfaces on which the filter cake forms, as in the case of soft sandstone formations.
Filter cakes may be formed during drilling and fracturing operations. Once a well bore is established, the producing zones along the well bore may be treated to increase their production rate. One such production stimulation treatment involves hydraulically fracturing the formation with a viscous treating fluid to create one or more cracks or “fractures.” As a fracture is created, a portion of the fluid contained in the viscous fracturing fluid leaks off into the formation and creates a filter cake comprising deposited viscosifying agent and fluid loss control agent on the walls of the fracture and the formation. The filter cake acts as a physical barrier to liquid travel that, as described above, helps reduce fluid loss into the producing zone. The filter cake may also present a barrier to flow of liquid from the zone, thus, after the fracturing operation has been completed, the filter cake generally needs to be removed to maximize oil and/or gas production.
Sand control operations, such as gravel packing, are also common after a well bore is drilled. One common type of gravel packing operation involves placing a gravel pack screen in the well bore and packing the surrounding annulus between the screen and the well bore with gravel of a specific size designed to prevent the passage of formation sand. The gravel pack screen is generally a filter assembly used to retain the gravel placed during gravel pack operation. A wide range of sizes and screen configurations are available to suit the characteristics of the gravel pack sand used. Similarly, a wide range of sizes of gravel is available to suit the characteristics of the unconsolidated or poorly consolidated particulates in the subterranean formation. The resulting structure presents a barrier to migrating sand from the formation while still permitting fluid flow. When installing the gravel pack, the gravel is carried to the formation in the form of a slurry by mixing the gravel with a transport fluid. Gravel packs act, inter alia, to stabilize the formation while causing minimal impairment to well productivity. The gravel, inter alia, acts to prevent the particulates from occluding the screen or migrating with the produced fluids, and the screen, inter alia, acts to prevent the gravel from entering the production tubing. Often, gravel packs are placed along a well bore having a filter cake on its walls.
While filter cakes may be beneficial, it is generally necessary to remove filter cakes from producing zones before the well is placed onto production. One known method for the removal of filter cakes from producing formations involves including an acid-soluble particulate solid bridging agent for bridging over the formation pores in the drilling, fracturing, gravel transport or other servicing fluid that forms the filter cake. Such an acid-soluble filter cake could then be removed by placing a strongly acidic acid solution in contact with the filter cake and allowing that solution to remain in contact for a period of time sufficient to dissolve the filter cake.
One consideration in removing a deposited filter cake from a subterranean well bore formation involves the timing of such removal. For instance, in situations where sand control of the formation is a concern, a filter cake offers some degree of control over unconsolidated particulates in the subterranean formation while placing the gravel pack. For example, if the filter cake is removed prior to gravel packing, the unconsolidated particulates are not controlled and well bore stability problems may arise causing the collapse of the bore hole and preventing the installation of a gravel pack. While installing the screen and placing the gravel before removing the filter cake helps control unconsolidated particulates and maintain bore hole stability, it also makes the filter cake itself more difficult to remove. This is because the screen and gravel represents a physical barrier between the filter cake on walls of the well bore and the acidic fluid used to remove the filer cake.
One conventional method that attempts to overcome that problem involves placing a breaker (e.g., an oxidizer, ester, enzyme, or the like) in the fracturing, transport or other servicing fluid that creates and/or treats the filter cake in hopes that the breaker will permeate the filter cake and break it down. However, because the breaker is dissolved in the servicing fluid and not all of the servicing fluid remains in the subterranean formation inter alia, while circulating a gravel pack, much of the breaker that is used gets circulated out of the well bore and does not interact with the filter cake as desired.
More recently, it has been found that acid-releasing degradable material may be coated onto a particulate and act at a delayed rate to produce acid such that the particulate may be placed in the subterranean formation adjacent to the filter cake before a substantial amount of acid is released. In such methods known in the art, the acid-releasing degradable material had to be coated onto the particulate in a controlled environment off-site from the well head. The material then had to be coated onto various types and sizes of gravel/proppant, stored, and transported before it could be used in a subterranean formation.